Minor league notes: Role in no-hitter gives Bulls reliever a home-state thrill

By Bob Sutton / Times-News

Published: Sunday, May 12, 2013 at 12:30 AM.

So he was truly back in home territory on the road trip. He had been the winning pitcher in a high school state finals series game at Pawtucket’s McCoy Stadium.

With starting pitcher Jake Odorizzi throwing the first seven innings and Frank De Los Santos and Kirby Yates following, it came down to Beliveau, who had watched the team’s first three pitchers combine to issue eight walks.

“Nobody wanted to be the guy (to lose the no-hit bid),” he said. “You try to work your nerves out in the bullpen.”

■ BOOKER REDISCOVERS NORMAL: Elon resident Greg Booker is spending another baseball season based in upstate New York as pitching coach for the Class AAA Syracuse Chiefs.

But during last week’s annual road series against the Durham Bulls — call it a business trip home for Booker — he said a sense of normalcy has returned around the International League team. This comes after a couple of season with quite a bit of buzz around the top affiliate of the Washington Nationals.

That’s because a couple of baseball’s top prospects — pitcher Stephen Strasburg and outfielder Bryce Harper — played for the Chiefs.

Strasburg played for Syracuse for part of the 2010 season and again for an appearance in 2011.

Considering he needed to record only one out, Jeff Beliveau put on quite a show for family and friends last Sunday.

The reliever for the Durham Bulls recorded the last out in the team’s no-hitter against the Pawtucket Red Sox.

“It was cool to come in and finish it off,” Beliveau said.

He was the fourth Durham pitcher used in the no-hitter, which came as part of a 2-1 victory.

That game took place in Pawtucket, R.I., giving Beliveau, who’s from nearly by Providence, the first chance in his six-year minor league career to play in his home region.

“I had 50 tickets that last game (of that series),” Beliveau said. “I had some family, uncles, who had never seen me pitch in pro ball. I never played back East.”

Beliveau, a 26-year-old left-hander, was a Chicago Cubs draftee, rising to Class AAA and then pitching in one game this year for the Texas Rangers’ top affiliate. His only previous professional assignment in the Eastern time zone came in the Florida State League.

So he was truly back in home territory on the road trip. He had been the winning pitcher in a high school state finals series game at Pawtucket’s McCoy Stadium.

With starting pitcher Jake Odorizzi throwing the first seven innings and Frank De Los Santos and Kirby Yates following, it came down to Beliveau, who had watched the team’s first three pitchers combine to issue eight walks.

“Nobody wanted to be the guy (to lose the no-hit bid),” he said. “You try to work your nerves out in the bullpen.”

■ BOOKER REDISCOVERS NORMAL: Elon resident Greg Booker is spending another baseball season based in upstate New York as pitching coach for the Class AAA Syracuse Chiefs.

But during last week’s annual road series against the Durham Bulls — call it a business trip home for Booker — he said a sense of normalcy has returned around the International League team. This comes after a couple of season with quite a bit of buzz around the top affiliate of the Washington Nationals.

That’s because a couple of baseball’s top prospects — pitcher Stephen Strasburg and outfielder Bryce Harper — played for the Chiefs.

Strasburg played for Syracuse for part of the 2010 season and again for an appearance in 2011.

Harper played 21 games last year for the Chiefs before a late-April promotion to the Nationals.

Booker said without the hype of those players that the start of the season involved less attention on the Chiefs.

Booker’s pitching staff has rated low in the International League, in large part to a 27-9 home loss to the Buffalo Bisons last month. There were 21 earned runs charged to the Chiefs in that game.

During the four-game trip to Durham, Syracuse held the Bulls to eight runs total.

With the third game of the series in Durham set for an 11:05 a.m. start, it gave Booker a chance to plan to have the Chiefs coaching staff visit his home for dinner that night. By Friday, there was a flight scheduled prior to 6 a.m. and a game later that night, something Booker referenced as the tough grind of the minor leagues.

■ PRITCHARD RELEASED: Former Elon University shortstop Neal Pritchard was released by the St. Louis Cardinals organization after reaching the Class AA level.

He was playing with the Springfield Cardinals of the Texas League. He batted .172 (5-for-29) across 14 games this season. His professional career began in 2011 when he was a member of the Appalachian League champion Johnson City Cardinals after he was signed as a non-drafted free agent.